Lake Winnebago, Missouri, sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b — a zone band wide enough that plant choice, not possibility, is the interesting question.
These conditions suit cabbage, hazelnut, lavender, and collard greens — a starting list any specific site will trim or extend with its own soil, sun, and drainage.
Even in Lake Winnebago, no two yards are alike.
A low spot, a south-facing slope, or a stand of trees moves the frost date and sun across a single Lake Winnebago lot. Enter your address and we'll score 1,086 plants against your land's actual soil, sun, and frost.
We read public map data around Lake Winnebago — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
No card required · your full report in seconds
Lake Winnebago — the short answer
Lake Winnebago, Missouri: USDA zone 6b, about 226 days between hard freezes, across 1K acres of city.
- USDA zone
- 6b
- USDA PHZM 2023
- Last hard freeze (28°F)
- Mar 29
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- First hard freeze (28°F)
- Nov 10
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- Days between freezes
- ~226
- NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals, 28°F — this town
- City area
- 1K acres
- US Census TIGER/Line 2025
Every figure names the dataset it came from. Hard-freeze dates are this town’s own 28°F normals: light frosts run a few weeks past them, and tender transplants usually wait 2–3 weeks after the last hard freeze.
Hardiness Zone Range
Zone 6b is Lake Winnebago's average, not your lot's — a low corner or a tree line moves it. Against Lake Winnebago's 226-day season, see what your own ground reads.
Soil varies lot by lot — soil types explained.
What this means for growing in Lake Winnebago
Each reading below is measured for Lake Winnebago itself — here is what it means for a garden here, and the move an experienced grower makes about it.
Season length
MeasuredLake Winnebago runs about 226 days between hard freezes — a long growing season.
There is slack for succession plantings and slow-finishing crops: many vegetables can be sown twice, and the heat-lovers have time to ripen fully.
Plan a second sowing of quick crops after the first comes out, and use the fall window most gardeners let sit idle.
NOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
Winter hardiness
MeasuredLake Winnebago sits in USDA hardiness zone 6b.
The zone sets which perennials, shrubs, and fruit trees live through an average winter here — a plant rated for a colder zone is a safe bet, one rated warmer needs winter protection or gets treated as an annual.
Match perennials and fruit to the zone before you buy, so nothing you plant is a gamble against the cold.
USDA PHZM 2023
The kind of country Lake Winnebago is in
Lake Winnebago sits in the Central Irregular Plains — EPA Level III, inside the wider Great Plains. That is read at Lake Winnebago's own centroid rather than borrowed from Cass County.
What Grows in Lake Winnebago
Every plant below cleared Lake Winnebago's own zone 6b and its 226-day season. Each card opens that plant's Missouri profile. How we score.
Is it too late to plant in Lake Winnebago?
Too late for some crops, right on time for others — a growing season is a sequence, not a deadline. Cool-season crops can go in from around Mar 1; tender transplants wait until two to three weeks after the last 28°F hard freeze, which lands near Mar 29 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals); and from midsummer, planting counts back from the first fall freeze around Nov 10 — long-season crops need about 90 days of runway, quick greens only 30. A long window like this one runs successions deep into fall — and even its last weeks take quick greens and garlic.
What's on the federal record near Lake Winnebago
Closest first, within ~10 miles of Lake Winnebago. Listing isn't leaking, and distance isn't exposure.
- T46N R31W 09Nitrate · 0.7 mi
- T46N R33W 04BNitrate · 0.8 mi
- SPIRIT #6Underground Storage Tanks · 1.5 mi
- T46N R31W 03ANitrate · 1.9 mi
- FORMER SWALL AUTO SUPPLY COMPANYUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.1 mi
- CASEYS GENERAL STORE #1014Underground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- T47N R31W 34Nitrate · 2.2 mi
- FASTOP GREENWOODUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.2 mi
- PEERY OIL CO INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- FASTOP INCUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
- MR LONGARM INCToxics Release Inventory · 2.3 mi
- GREENWOODUnderground Storage Tanks · 2.3 mi
6 more sites are on the record inside the same radius. See them on the map
Measured from Lake Winnebago's center, not your beds. Run your own address for what's upwind of you specifically.
Environmental Intelligence
The counts behind that headline — every source type on the record near Lake Winnebago.
Total Sites
436
within ~10 miles of Lake Winnebago
Risk Level
Elevated
Highest-severity
3 Superfund sites (none NPL-listed)
Sources Checked
within ~10 miles of Lake Winnebago
Severity Distribution
within ~10 miles of Lake Winnebago
Highest-Severity Sites
A note from Gnorman
What an experienced grower watches for around here
In and around Lake Winnebago, two things run higher than the national average within ~10 miles of Lake Winnebago — PFAS (8 sites) and Toxics Release Inventory (29 sites). It's not cause for alarm — it's worth knowing, and there's a sensible way to grow around it.
PFAS: PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are called "forever chemicals" because they do not biodegrade.
Toxics Release Inventory: TRI facilities report annual chemical releases to air, water, and land.
Test irrigation water source — this is the primary pathway for PFAS to reach garden crops.
Check prevailing wind direction — downwind parcels face higher exposure than upwind or crosswind locations.
Check your specific parcel in Lake Winnebago
Get exact proximity distances to contamination sources for your specific parcel — plus soil, sun, drainage, and 1,086 plant recommendations.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lake Winnebago average
Your land is one point inside Lake Winnebago
Everything above resolves to Lake Winnebago as a whole — one PHZM band and one 28°F frost record, read across 1K acres. Your parcel is one point inside that footprint. Slope, tree cover, a low spot that pools cold air, and what is in the soil are all resolved at the address, and none of them are visible at city scale. That is the honest boundary of this page, and the reason the next step is a reading of your own ground rather than a better local average.
Your Lot vs the Lake Winnebago Average
Lake Winnebago Average
- ●USDA Zones 6b, averaged across Lake Winnebago
- ●One soil character for all of Lake Winnebago
- ●Frost dates read at Lake Winnebago's scale: Mar 29 to Nov 10
YOUR Parcel
- ✓Your exact zone, not Lake Winnebago's 6b
- ✓Your SSURGO soil type & pH
- ✓Your sun exposure, cast in 3D
See MY Growing Report
Read your specific parcel in Lake Winnebago
Pull a site-specific report for your exact address in Lake Winnebago, Missouri — soil, sun, drainage, frost risk, and scored plant recommendations.
Three things about your lot that Lake Winnebago averages can't show:
We read public map data around Lake Winnebago — soil, climate, flood, and parcel records. How we handle your address.
25+ data sources read at your address, not the Lake Winnebago average
How we know this about Lake Winnebago
The datasets: hardiness from the USDA ARS Plant Hardiness Zone Map 2023, read at this city’s own centroid; hard-freeze dates from NOAA 1991–2020 28°F normals at Lake Winnebago’s own record; boundaries and acreage from US Census TIGER/Line 2025; the contamination records from the federal sources named in their beats above. Soil is not read at city grain anywhere on this page — there is no city-resolution survey in our data, which is why you will find no soil grid here rather than a statewide one wearing a local label. The resolution ledger below names every figure this page inherited.
Common questions about Lake Winnebago
When does frost risk typically end in Lake Winnebago?
The last hard freeze (28°F) in Lake Winnebago typically lands around Mar 29, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — earlier than the light-frost dates most charts quote. That marks the hard freeze, not the last light frost — lighter frosts keep biting past it, which is why tender transplants here wait until about Apr 19.
When is the first frost in Lake Winnebago?
The first hard freeze (28°F) in Lake Winnebago typically arrives around Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals — the point tender summer crops finish. Lighter frosts run ahead of it, near Oct 27, so the watching starts about Oct 11 — about 226 days after the spring freeze cleared.
How long is the growing season in Lake Winnebago?
Measured between 28°F hard freezes, Lake Winnebago sees about 226 frost-free days — roughly Mar 29 through Nov 10, per NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals. Tender crops work a shorter one: nearer Apr 19 to Oct 27, about 191 days.
Is the soil safe to grow vegetables in Lake Winnebago?
The federal record around Lake Winnebago is a meaningful one — 436 documented sites, mostly Underground Storage Tanks entries (200), the nearest Nitrate record about 0.7 miles out — so a soil test before new food beds is a sensible precaution here, not a reason to hold back from growing. Remember that proximity to a documented site is information, not a diagnosis of any one yard; the contamination map shows exactly what sits where.
How do I protect my plants from frost in Lake Winnebago?
From about Oct 11 the job here turns from planting to protecting — the last start even a 30-day crop can finish. As the season closes around the first 28°F hard freeze near Nov 10 (NOAA 1991–2020 climate normals), three moves buy time: row cover or an old sheet over tender plants on still, clear nights; water the soil the afternoon before a freeze, so it holds warmth overnight; and harvest tomatoes, peppers and basil before Nov 10. Hardy greens and roots shrug off light frost and sweeten after it — leave them in.
Everything above is measured at Lake Winnebago's scale — its 6b band and its 226-day season. Your yard writes its own version of Lake Winnebago's numbers: we read soil, sun, drainage and frost at your exact address. Try it for 14 days — no card required.
What this page reads at Lake Winnebago’s own scale
6 of the readings below were taken at Lake Winnebago's own scale — its own ~226-day season between 28°F freezes, the 1,485 acres it covers and 436 documented sites around it; 4 are borrowed from a wider read, named and linked below.
Measured here
- Lake Winnebago's own USDA hardiness band, zones 6bUSDA PHZM 2023
- Lake Winnebago's own 28°F hard-freeze dates, about Mar 29 and Nov 10 and the ~226-day span between themNOAA 1991–2020 Climate Normals
- 436 documented contamination sites on the federal record near Lake Winnebago, the closest Nitrate record about 0.7 miles out from the town centreFederal environmental registers
- Lake Winnebago's boundary and the 1,485 acres inside itUS Census TIGER/Line 2025
- Which of 1,086 plants clear zones 6b and a ~226-day seasonGrowable Ground crop-matching engine
- The ecoregion at Lake Winnebago's own centroid, the Central Irregular PlainsUS EPA Level III Ecoregions
Inherited from a wider read
- Soil character — no town-scale survey exists, so Lake Winnebago's 1,485 acres read through its county's SSURGO summaryfrom Cass County
- Growing-degree days and winter chill — measured county-wide only, so the county page carries themfrom Cass County
- The growing challenges every Missouri grower plans around — written at state scale, so they stay on the state guidefrom Missouri
- Butterfly and beetle records, and the farmland pesticide estimate — all published county-widefrom Cass County
What this page can’t tell you
- The soil pH, drainage, sun hours, and frost pockets on any one lot among Lake Winnebago's 1,485 acreswhy one lot differs from the next →
- Which side of Lake Winnebago you're on — a low spot frosts first and a south wall warms early, and one normal is being asked to speak for all 1,485 acresreading your own microclimate →
- How close that record sits to YOUR lot — the closest Nitrate record about 0.7 miles out, measured from the town centrehow we read the record →
- Where cold air settles, which slopes face the sun, and which way the wind runs on your own ground — measured at your address, and averaged away by any Lake Winnebago-wide figureread your own land →
More in Missouri
Wider growing context
What grows across MissouriLake Winnebago sits outside our named growing regions, so Missouri as a whole is its closest context here.
Nearby growing guides